What Keeps Me Up…

First: The number of churches that have grown into the thousands since 1990?
– Literally thousands have. (For example: From 2000-2005 the number of churches with attendance over 5,000 doubled).

Second: The number of churches have started since 1990?
– Approximately 30,000.

Ok. That’s not exactly what keeps me up at night. This is. If, since 1990, hundreds of churches have catapulted into the thousands (some into the tens of thousands), and about 30,000 new churches have been “successfully” started (many of them growing into the thousands) … how is it possible that there are less people going to church now than in 1990 in every single county in the United States? And how is it possible that the number of people going to church is down by about 8 million).

My O-pinion: The church isn’t reaching the unchurched. If we were bringing people in who didn’t leave one church to join another there’s no possible way the stats would look like this. We can do better. We have to. We need to determine what is a true and sacred tradition vs. is it the way we’ve always done it so we’re not changing it…